


On the Train

by DarthSuki



Category: Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood & Manga
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, F/M, M/M, Soulmate-Identifying Marks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-10
Updated: 2017-10-10
Packaged: 2019-01-15 13:35:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,328
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12322095
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DarthSuki/pseuds/DarthSuki
Summary: You've had the alchemic symbols on your palms since your 18th birthday, but you never once imagined that you would meet your soulmate on a random train heading to South City.





	On the Train

The marks scare you from the day you find them on your palms. It doesn’t take a genius to recognize the symbols, alchemical in meaning but lost to you in details. They sit on the skin of your hands, revealing themselves in a slow, dripping flow of dark ink over the course of a few days after your 18th birthday.

You sought out the meaning of the symbols from several family friends, but few of them could give you any insight on their meaning, and you were too nervous to try them out in any actual motion for a year or so after finding them. Afraid of what they would do, who they might hurt--you had only a basic understanding of Alchemy as a science or practice, so to try and figure them out through trial and error would only produce more questions than anything else.

They didn’t hamper your day-to-day life though, and over several years you found yourself happily living in an apartment in Central City, the marks long-since forgotten. They became no more than conversation starters than anything else, people catching a glance of them on the train or on the street and asking if they were your own or your soul mate’s.

Soul mate. You wondered what kind of person they were, if they had tattoos like that on their hands. They had to be alchemists, all things considered, but it threw you for a loop and a half to try and figure out what kind of alchemist they were since you couldn’t decipher much of the marks. 

* * *

 

Traveling was something you found enjoyment in soon after moving to Central City. The fare of the train was cheap to travel south, so you often found yourself visiting Rush Valley, Dublith and even South City whenever you had the spare days to take from work to do so. It was calming, exploring the country, and it led you to meeting all sorts of interesting people and, of course, they would all find interest the the marks on your palms.

The man who you had struck up a conversation with was much the same.

“Your soul mate must be an alchemist,” he said, tone polite and gentle. “But what do you think about it?”

He seems very kind, perhaps a buisiness man of some sort. He wears a white suit, clean and pressed of wrinkles. While it may stand out in some way, you can’t help but like the cleanliness of it, his appearance, especially when it’s so stark against his long black hair. It’s tied back loosely, but let you catch the gaze of the man’s bright blue eyes every now and again as the two of you speak.

“Well,” you say. “I hope that my soul mate is someone who is a good person, who uses their alchemy to seek out knowledge and learn more about the world.”

You can’t help but feel his gaze even when you’re not looking over at him beside you. It’s hard on you, unmoving, but it doesn’t unnerve you. It feels...curious? Firmer than most, at least, and you’re not sure why his interest and close proximity in the seat directly next to you isn’t making you feel uncomfortable.

You’ve felt your share of unnerving men and women alike, but he is....comforting? Odd to describe a stranger in that way, but it felt appropriate.

He flashes you a smile, knocking you out of your thoughts. You were staring at him.

“I’m--I’m sorry,” You say to fix your momentary lack of manners. “I didn’t mean to stare.”

“It’s not a problem,” He murmurs, gently adjusting the white gloves over his hands.. “I’m not bothered by it any. Your thoughts seem to be weighing on you after all.”

You take a moment to compose yourself and let out a breath. You can feel his shoulder bumping against your own.

“You just feel....” 

“Familiar?”

The word catches you off-guard, finishing your sentence perfectly. 

“Yes. You feel familiar, but I know I’ve never met you.” You shift in your seat, not sure if you’re being impolite or awkward by the sudden shift in the conversation. The two of you had to have been talking for twenty minutes before your thoughts had begun to sour it.

Silence filled the air between the two of you.

It must have lasted for several minutes. After some time you figured that the conversation was over, and you had turned your head to stare out the window, watching the scenery fly by to frame the setting sun. The sight is rather beautiful, but the sound of the man’s voice pulls you out of your thoughts for a second time.

“...What if your soul mate isn’t someone who seeks knowledge with their alchemy?”

You blink. When you turn your face towards the man, you find him staring at you; how long had he been looking?

“Wh-....what?” The question falls from your lips in a whisper. You’re still trying to catch what he’s getting on about.

The man’s gaze hardens, and his expression is hard to read beyond seeming neutral. 

“What if your soul mate isn’t a good man? What if he had done terrible things in the eyes of others in his life? What if, whether he wanted to make amends or not for his actions, your soul mate was not the pure-hearted alchemist you seem to hope for?”

There is weight in the questions. Heavy weight. These aren’t the questions you’re used to, ones that normal strangers ask. These are heavy questions, ones that thinly-hide a level of connection behind them to the man asking them. Between the solemn tone of the man’s voice and his hard gaze on you, you can’t find the will to answer. Instead, your mouth opens and closes uselessly as you try to find the words or thoughts to even begin to form an answer.

By the time you’re any closer to a response, the man is already pulling off the white gloves. The motion seems unrelated, but then--

You catch the sight of familiar marks on the palms of both the man’s hands. Marks that you remember seeing years ago, marks of mystery and intrigue that, even currently, lay on your own palms.

The man sitting next to you is your soul mate.

He looks at you as you slowly come to the realization, watching in such a level of intrigue as a predator might of prey. Tension fills the air, but you feel no poison in his gaze, no harm in his eyes. Curiosity, apathetic curiosity is all you feel at first between you both. 

The questions begin to make sense, giving you a shallow, but concrete sense of who the man was sitting next to you. What the marks meant and what they meant of the man himself. 

Though you had a plethora of further questions, you let out a breath and began with only one:

“...What is your name?”

“Solf. J. Kimblee,” he said, watching your breath catch at the sound of the name. Regardless, he must not have found the fear, the apprehension or terror that he might have been expecting. His face slowly morphs into a look of satisfaction and amusement. “I suppose that means we have a lot of questions to answer for one another.”

You take in a slow breath, then glance towards the window and the setting sun outside, flickering from the constant, passing trees and small hills as the train ran on through the countryside. 

“We do have several hours more on this train, after all.” You look back at Kimblee, at his hands, and then at your own. There were certainly stories that came with the man’s name, but you felt no fear under his bright, blue eyes--only curiosity. Intrigue. “I’ll save my judgement on you being a terrible man until after then.”

“I find that very fair,” Kimblee said, a smirk growing on his lips.


End file.
